The Office of After-Life Affairs - Paused
by Kaiimei
Summary: Working as the senior undersecretary to the chief reincarnation officer, who himself was directly under Kami, was a rather rewarding job. Kayla got to see massive Space Marines, beautiful Kunoichi, monstrous soul-stealing Undead, benign Office Workers, and all manner of weird and wacky people. Never a dull day in TOALA.


**This idea came to me randomly, and I fucking love it. I hope you all do as well!**

_**BIG DISCLAIMER!**_

**I own The Office of After-Life Affairs, Kayla, and all related TOALA characters, but nothing else. All other content is owned by its respective...uhh...entities! So yeah, not mine. I'll try to list at the bottom every book, game, film or show that the characters come from, but I might forget.**

_**Chapter 1**_

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_**The Office of After-Life Affairs (TOALA)**_

The plaque firmly in place on the wall beside her desk was big, bold, and beautiful. A gilded plate of forged spirit-steel held the lettering, a golden and shining statement. Or at least, what was what the office seminars said when they discussed why the office budget still had plenty of excess to get it replated every few weeks when some new soul managed to scuff it up one way or another.

With a clang, she resisted the urge to bury her head in her hands as an 8-foot tall minotaur bumped against the metal, the ringlets attached to his armour scratching the surface and flecking off gouges of the gilding. "Ahem." Kayla politely cleared her throat to get the creature's attention, not flinching when his red eyes levelled a firm glare at her. "If you could please refrain from damaging spirit property, it would be appreciated."

Huffing, the brute took a look at the scratched gold and rolled his shoulders, but thankfully moved away from the sign before he caused more damage. "How long this take?" He growled out, his voice rough from the translated words on his tongue. It was an extremely aggravating piece of spirit-weaving, created by a rather...curious trickster when he made a passing acquaintance with the office. It translated words just fine, but it made sure that the accents or dialect of the one speaking came through in full force, sometimes leaving the final speech unrecognizable.

Vowing again to strangle Desmond Tiny if he ever set foot in the office again, she got back to typing away at her computer, switching tacks to thank the helpful man who aided the office in setting them up. Sure, he probably did it for the reimbursement package that was offered thanks to his technical skills, but that didn't change the fact that due to his actions, the office moved away from the type-writers they'd been using for millennia, and almost fully digitized the entire process.

It sucked how the most advanced world their branch of TOALA was bound to was running on a time-stream about twenty times slower than theirs, meaning they had to wait a very long time for technological advancements, but they were immortal, patience was a necessity. Even if it was strained at times by aggravating souls. "I'm sorry Mr Stonehand, but right now Mr Honorhall is in a meeting with Kami, and won't be able to meet with you for another..." She checked her watch. "...Hmm, by your time-standards...around thirteen alv." With another growl, the Minotaur slumped down hard onto one of the few waiting sofas. "if you'd like, you could view another world while you wait? I hear the Akalion world is currently experiencing a particularly bloodthirsty war, perhaps that would be to your interest?"

Kayla wasn't particularly partial to any of the worlds she was regularly sent to watch over, many of which were rather boring. She remembered a few worlds though, the one coming to mind being a beautiful jungle-world where she got to watch the octopoidal natives go about their day to day lives, which was definitely a wonderful experience. She wasn't sent to watch the actual worlds, but more specifically certain interesting reincarnates, usually those with complicated stipulations for their contract, or errors in their reincarnation documentation.

Errors didn't happen often, but with any bureaucracy controlled by those who were even slightly fallible, errors were bound to occur. Whilst her fellow office workers were good, an absurdly small number could count themselves amongst the legions of those who were currently seen as infallible. A single error would change that, and so those who were infallible were meticulous in making sure their documents were correct.

Not to say that the other workers weren't also meticulous, but none matched the almost feverish intensity those few possessed when checking their documents before sending them for processing. Kayla was quite thankful for those who were so perfect, since it meant she had less paperwork and hassle to deal with.

Her job, in broad terms, was to act as a sieve. Any and all incorrectly-filed documents would find their way onto her desk. Kayla would check to see whether or not the error could be corrected. If so, she would do so and send it off for re-submission. If, however, the document couldn't be fixed, typically by way of the soul having already been processed, she would forward it to her Boss, who would then bring it to the knowledge of Kami if necessary, or fix it himself if he could.

Aside from that, she did all the typical things a secretary would do, scheduling meetings, keeping records, managing general documentation, and as evidenced by the Minotaur alternating between viewing a world and glaring at her, 'entertaining' souls.

Currently, the Minotaur in the room was there to see her boss due to a misfiled document accidentally down-grading his reincarnation, making him inferior to what his contract stipulated. Because of this, he was pulled from his world at an opportune moment and given the choice between simply continuing as he was, then getting a much better reincarnation upon his natural death, or being given a single request.

This request was HEAVILY regimented, with stipulations upon stipulations to limit exactly what he could request. A sword which could cut through anything? Not a problem. Mind-control abilities? Sure, just not on TOALA employees. The powers of a God? That's where the contract drew a rather firm line. Anything that could upset the balance like that was not allowed. The same for true resurrection abilities, soul-destroying techniques, and anything of the like. It was a damn powerful request still, but not...too absurd.

The price though was that his next reincarnation would be what he was initially mean to receive, meaning he would likely end up in a pretty bog-standard situation. Of course, nobody retained their memories...or at least, they weren't meant to. Occasionally reincarnated souls would still remember their visit to the office. These were typically the souls she ended up going on field-trips to baby-sit, making sure they didn't do anything stupid like try to spread word of what had happened to them. If they did that, the soul would regrettably be pulled from their world, forcibly if necessary, and re-processed with a penalty.

The best part? She could do it all from the same perspective they lived in. If they lived as a gaseous and sentient cloud, she could do so as well. Aqueous bottom-dweller? She got to be a fish. If they were bipedal that was preferred, thanks to the standard avatar of TOALA employees being based as two-legged upright anthropomorphs. Some of her favourite experiences ended up being on worlds like that, with a surprisingly large number of them being the same species...: Humans.

Here are just a few of her favourites.

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**Short first chapter, I know.**

**What do you guys think? Do you like the idea? I think it's a pretty awesome one, having Kayla jumping between different worlds and getting into fun situations. She will also spend some time in the office running into characters but with the shoe on the other foot, since they'll be the ones in a new environment.**

**Anyways, here's the mentions for where characters came from. I've decided I'll list TOALA characters as well just for clarification.**

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**Kayla - TOALA Original Character, by Kaii.**

**Mr Stonehand ****\- TOALA Original Character, by Kaii.**

**Mr Honorhall ****\- TOALA Original Character, by Kaii.**

**Desmond (Des Tiny) Tiny - Cirque Du Freak Character, by Darren O'Shaughnessy.**


End file.
